Microsoft’s Activision acquisition would instantly make it a force in mobile gaming

theverge.com:

With its pending acquisition of Activision Blizzard, Microsoft could soon add the likes of Diablo, Warcraft, and Call of Duty to its lineup of big-name franchises, which already includes everything from Halo to Minecraft to Fallout. That’s sure to move more Xbox consoles and bring more subscribers into the increasingly tempting Game Pass ecosystem. But there’s another, less obvious, part of the deal that could be just as important: it instantly gives Microsoft a huge audience in the mobile space.

The biggest video games in the world are largely found on smartphones, and for the last few years, major publishers have been spending lots of money to get into the space. Just this month, Take-Two — the company behind the likes of NBA 2K and Grand Theft Auto — spent nearly $13 billion to acquire FarmVille developer Zynga. Before that, EA scooped up the likes of Glu Mobile and Playdemic for smaller, but still massive, sums. Years earlier, when Activision Blizzard wanted to get a leg up in mobile, it spent $5.9 billion on Candy Crush creator King.

Provided the Microsoft acquisition goes through — the deal isn’t expected to close until “fiscal year 2023,” and a lot could happen in that time — Candy Crush would become yet another integral piece of the company’s portfolio. And the franchise has proven to be an enduring hit. Analyst firm Sensor Tower estimates that, since January 2014, Candy Crush Saga has generated around $7.1 billion, while its spinoff Candy Crush Soda Saga has taken in $2.9 billion.

Since the King acquisition, mobile has become an increasingly important part of Activision’s portfolio; Call of Duty Mobile, created in partnership with Tencent, is a massive game, and Blizzard is also planning to launch a smartphone